


Five Quirks Dana Scully Noticed About Fox Mulder During Their First Year as Partners

by sarken



Category: The X-Files
Genre: 5 Things, Gen, early years
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-10-13
Updated: 2007-10-13
Packaged: 2017-10-04 11:41:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 545
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarken/pseuds/sarken
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five things Scully learns about Mulder during their first year working together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Quirks Dana Scully Noticed About Fox Mulder During Their First Year as Partners

I.

Mulder doesn't own a clock.

That might seem like a thinly veiled sarcastic remark about his chronic tardiness or his late-night phone calls, but it's actually just the God's honest truth. She found out at 1:33 one morning, over a long distance line from Alexandria to Georgetown, when she said, "Look at the clock, Mulder. Please look at the clock and tell me what time it is."

About four seconds of silence ticked by before he said, "I don't have a clock." He sounded confused, like he had never noticed this before. "I mean, I have my watch, but I don't have a clock."

She felt something stir inside of her, and she said, "It's one thirty-four, Mulder. Good night."

She hung up the phone, but stayed awake the rest of the night, wondering what kind of person wouldn't realize he didn't own a clock.

II.

There's that porn thing, which she doesn't want to think about. That was embarrassing for both of them, and they'll just joke about it until they can forget how embarrassing it was.

III.

Until Alabama, she thought Mulder was so paranoid he wouldn't let housekeeping into his motel room.

No matter what state they spent the night in, no matter how early they had to be out the door, his bed was always made. Not neatly, but the bedspread would be pulled up and tucked beneath the pillow. For a while, she thought he might start buying mints from the vending machines and placing them on his pillow. That seemed excessive, though, because they never stayed anywhere that nice.

Then Mobile happened, and he started yelling in his sleep on a Thursday night. She woke him carefully, and he was dizzy and feverish.

"It's all right," she whispered, but the words stuck in her throat, stopping her from making them into a soothing mantra.

When he came back from the bathroom, she had turned down the bed for him, but he stood back and stared at it, looking like a little boy afraid of the monsters hiding beneath the bed skirt. She didn't know what to say, so she wordlessly handed him the television remote and went back to her room. As she slid beneath the cool sheets, she realized she had never seen him sleep beneath the covers.

IV.

She's eaten enough meals with him to know that he sniffs everything before he eats it.

She wishes he were half as cautious about everything else.

V.

He lives on the fourth floor and never opens his windows, but he's obsessive about checking the locks. He can't remember to put the deadbolt on his door, and half of Washington has the keys anyway, but he once spent ten minutes on the window locks before he was willing to leave.

One night, the first warm night since fall, she invited him over for a working dinner. While she cleaned the dishes, he walked through her apartment, shutting and locking all of her windows.

"Mulder," she said, standing in doorway to her bedroom and drying her hands on a dishtowel, "whatcha doing?"

He turned away from the window and said, "It was getting a little cold in here."

She thinks it has something to do with his sister.

:end:


End file.
